Don’t break out your cocktail shakers yet, though.
Scientists using a radio telescope at the Institut de Radioastronomie Millimetrique in Sierra Nevada, Spain found that Comet Lovejoy contains two basic building blocks of life: alcohol and sugar. Specifically, ethyl alcohol and glycolaldehyde.
Comets often contain the earliest identifiable materials from the formation of a solar system, so these findings give us important information about the early history of our solar system. Astrophysicist Dominique Bockelée-Morvan told the AFP:
“The presence of a major complex organic molecule in comet material is an essential step toward better understanding the conditions that prevailed at the moment when life emerged on our planet,”
via Neatorama
Image: Jazz Guy
